Moscow: Russian budget can do without Belarusian money

The refusal from the Belarusian export duties has already been partially taken into account in the Russian budget project for 2015.

The rest is insignificant and will not change much, Russian Minister of Finance Anton Siluanov said. The budget income made on the sale of oil differs from the expectations of the Ministry because the price for energy carriers in the world market already does not correspond to the forecasts – it keeps decreasing.

"Everything is getting balanced. That is why we would not be getting as much from Belarus as we did last year. That is why it will not affect the federal budget much,” RIA Novosti quotes the Minister.

According to Belarusian-Russian negotiations in Sochi, Belarus will be able to keep the oil products export duties in 2015 (about $2.5 billion, Minsk believes). It will be Russia’s compensation for the losses that Belarus is going to suffer due to the Russian ‘tax manoeuvre’. Belarus and Russia will conduct additional negotiations about the oil tax manoeuvre within the next three or four months.